South Florida has bloomed as America’s new capital for capital.

Some of the region’s leading developers and city leaders make the argument that the trend is permanent and practical as New York City lost billions of dollars in income to the region.

“We as a company, as a family, want to be known for not only building beautiful buildings and shaping skylines, but really creating neighborhoods and creating neighborhoods that can provide housing for everybody,” Related Group CEO Jon Paul Perez told Fox News Digital. “We want Miami to be a world-class city, but we don’t want Miami to be a world-class city just for the wealthy.”

“In a lot of ways across the world, there’s already recognition for the South Florida market as a whole pre-pandemic, but [it] certainly took a completely different turn,” Integra Investments founder and Home Builders of South Florida President Nelson Stabile also told Digital.

GOODBYE, N.Y.C., HELLO MIAMI: WHY MILLIONAIRES ARE FLOCKING TO SOUTH FLORIDA

“I think we benefited a lot from the state’s position and approach into being a little bit more pro-business, a little more open than other markets,” Stabile added, “and that sort of propelled us into a quicker recovery, which has kept us going through today.”

Both Perez and Nelson weren’t surprised by a recent report from New York’s Citizens Budget Commission, which found New York City witnessed an outflow of tens of thousands of high-earning residents from 2017 through 2022, who took close to $14 billion in income with them to Florida – with more than $9.2 billion going to Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties.

“People realize that they love living down here. It’s a pro-business environment, low taxes, and they can move their companies here and not sort of feel like they’re missing out,” Perez said. “Miami’s become sort of like this New York of the South, where we have finance, we have tech, we have hospitality, we have big cruise industries. So we’ve become a much more diversified economy over the last five years.”

“A change for the greater has made, I think, the city a much more diverse, intellectual city,” the CEO continued. “And we feel strongly that that will continue because I think it’s sort of been discovered now. And when things get discovered, they just continue to expand it and do better.”

“I feel like it’s a natural decision to at least have a presence here in some ways,” Stabile pointed out, noting the “impressive” report numbers are backed by companies like Citadel, Starwood Capital, Apple, Kaseya and Related Ross establishing a “Class-A” presence.

“When you see a major player in the investment world making the decision to move all of their employees and establish their home base here in Miami, in South Florida… it’s exciting,” Stabile said. “The firm comes, then once they’re here, their investments in the area in other projects just continue to grow exponentially.”

The Citizen Budget Commission’s report listed the top reasons that those leaving New York City were driven by: the pandemic, immigration policy, affordability concerns, quality of life issues and work opportunities.

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Perez, whose father burst onto the South Florida real estate scene in 1979 and has sold more than $50 billion worth of properties with Related Group, and Stabile – who has called the area home for 32 years and represents the local NAHB chapter – put an emphasis on general well-being as the primary rationale for moving south.

But, there is some worry that steadily rising demand and low supply could price residents out of the hottest markets, like New York City has experienced for decades.

WHY THIS RESORT AREA IN FLORIDA IS BECOMING MORE POPULAR FOR HOMEBUYERS

“Six years ago, if you were to have a conversation about rental rates, the whole market was somewhere between $45, $50, maybe $60 a foot. Today, in those same prime markets, Coral Gables is hovering around $100 a foot. And in Brickell, you’re seeing office leases being signed somewhere between $125 to $150 a foot. That’s almost triple the price points that we saw in the past,” Stabile explained.

“The only way to balance that scale is to provide more product in the market,” Stabile expanded. “Our market just wasn’t prepared and producing enough new households through new construction projects to be able to make sure that rents would keep at the same levels. So inevitably, there’s more competition for the inventory that exists, and then pricing can be pushed up, and it did. So that is a concern.”

“With these high-earners now, comparing the price of housing here in South Florida to where they’re coming from, I think we’re still underpriced,” Perez argued. “I think what you’re going to see over time is that there really shouldn’t be a discount for South Florida compared to New York, Los Angeles, London, because we are now a major city.”

“One of our key things that we focus on as a company is to provide more workforce housing and affordable housing for really the working class, the middle class, because what we don’t want to happen in the city is that we become a city just for the rich,” Perez said.

Indeed, developers and city planners are actively working together to tear down red tape and speed up residential and commercial building projects to meet permanent migration demand.

“If you bring in more density in vertical developments around public transportation nodes, if you will, you increase the probability of the residents of those areas in utilizing the available infrastructure for public transportation instead of congesting the roads further and further,” Stabile said.

“New York is never not going to be New York. Miami will always be its own version of the Wall Street of the South.” – Jon Paul Perez

There’s also Florida’s Live Local Act, which was designed to promote affordable housing by offering developers tax, regulatory, land use and funding incentives.

“It was taking a very long period of time from the moment a property owner or an investor would acquire property to when they could effectively start building,” according to Stabile. “The local level jurisdictions need to expedite the process in this sort of way and fashion, so that there is a very clear path for the developer to be able to build… It’s [now] gone through two rounds of amendments, and it’s getting better and better every single time in a way that the kinks are being worked out.”

“The biggest red tape for us, and any developer down here, to be able to meet the supply is getting through the approval and the permitting process,” Perez agreed. “And it’s a thing that we see with the local officials, the head of the building department, the city managers… It can take projects from the time you buy a piece of land till you get a permit, you can be two and a half, three years.”

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“We’re very bullish,” Stabile concluded, “and strongly believe in the fact that Florida will continue to be very well-poised to benefit from all of this migration. I do think that from our end, what we can do is, especially being local and understanding the… pain points of the growth and potential… is continue to work together with our governmental bodies to make sure that we’re providing… the infrastructure that’s gonna be needed to absorb all of this positive migration.”

“New York is never not going to be New York. Miami will always be its own version of the Wall Street of the South,” Perez said. “They want to come down and see what’s going on. They all realize the change that’s happened here and how important of a city South Florida has become.”

Florida’s housing market has moved decisively from scorching-hot to increasingly fragile. After experiencing some of the nation’s steepest home price appreciation during the Pandemic Housing Boom, Florida is now leading on the way down — particularly in its condo sector. In 92 percent of tracked Florida metro areas, condo prices are falling, and two-thirds of its single-family markets are posting year-over-year declines. While the national housing market remains resilient — with single-family prices up 2.8 percent and condo prices eking out a 0.4 percent gain — Florida is unmistakably in correction mode.

What explains this divergence? A perfect storm of economic, regulatory, and demographic shifts has upended the once-overheated supply-demand dynamics that propelled Florida real estate to record heights. From migration reversals and insurance shocks to tighter financing conditions and overbuilt inventory, Florida’s housing market is facing pressure on multiple fronts.

Post-Pandemic Migration Reversal

The extraordinary surge of migration into Florida during the pandemic was central to its housing boom. Between March 2020 and June 2022, home prices in the state soared 51 percent, compared to 41 percent nationally, fueled by an influx of remote workers and retirees fleeing higher-cost states. But that inflow has slowed sharply. Net domestic migration to Florida dropped to just 64,000 in 2024 — down more than 75 percent from the 314,000 peak in 2022.

That reversal has fundamentally weakened demand for housing of all sorts. Without the steady inflow of higher-income, out-of-state buyers, Florida’s housing markets are increasingly reliant on local purchasing power. And with wage growth failing to keep pace with rising costs of ownership — particularly for insurance and association fees — affordability constraints are biting hard.

Regulatory Fallout

The 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, which killed 98 people, has led to sweeping changes in Florida’s building safety regulations. These rules now mandate structural inspections and higher reserve funding for repairs, particularly in older condo buildings near the coast. While well-intentioned, the financial and logistical burdens have been severe. Homeowners associations have levied significant special assessments and hiked monthly dues — sometimes on an order of hundreds of dollars per month.

This regulatory shock has hit condos particularly hard, both by raising carrying costs and by chilling demand in older buildings seen as liabilities. As a result, Florida’s condo market has softened more acutely than its single-family segment. In Punta Gorda, condo prices have fallen 11.4 percent over the past year. In Tampa and North Port, declines are near or above 8 percent.

Hurricane Ian’s Lingering Effects

Natural disasters often have unpredictable consequences for housing markets, and Hurricane Ian was no exception. The 2022 storm caused nearly $115 billion in damage, flooding homes and destabilizing infrastructure in Southwest Florida communities like Cape Coral and Punta Gorda. The result has been a flood of damaged inventory entering the market alongside rising rebuilding costs, strained insurance capacity, and reduced buyer interest.

In these areas, the result is clear: year-over-year price drops of 5 to 7 percent for single-family homes, with even steeper losses in the condo segment. The shadow of future storm risk — and rising insurance costs — continues to depress valuations.

A Surge in New Supply

Unlike many urban markets constrained by zoning or geography, Florida boasts a relatively elastic housing supply. It’s a mixed blessing. During the boom, developers ramped up aggressively, particularly in exurban and suburban markets. Now, those homes are coming online just as demand wanes. New construction incentives — especially mortgage rate buydowns — have made builder homes more attractive relative to existing inventory, putting further pressure on resale values.

In fact, Florida is one of the few states where active listings now exceed pre-pandemic levels. While housing inventory remains tight nationally, Florida is seeing a relative glut — especially in areas where price appreciation outpaced fundamentals.

Punta Gorda, Florida is a clear example of a market where home prices outran true value, condo prices falling 11.4 percent and single-family home prices declining 7.3 percent year-over-year as of early 2025. This correction reflects how pandemic-era price surges, rising insurance costs, and new regulatory pressures have exposed underlying weaknesses in overheated Florida markets.

The Insurance Affordability Crisis

Perhaps no factor looms larger in Florida’s current housing woes than the state’s mounting home insurance crisis. While the median US premium has risen 33 percent over the past three years, Florida homeowners have faced significantly larger increases due to outsized hurricane exposure, rising replacement costs, and a volatile reinsurance market. In some parts of the state, annual premiums now exceed $10,000.

These spikes are exacerbating affordability issues. Homebuyers not only face elevated purchase prices (relative to pre-pandemic levels), but also steeper monthly carrying costs. Combined with higher HOA dues, mortgage rates still near two-decade highs, and broader inflationary pressures, the overall cost of owning a Florida home has become unsustainable for many prospective buyers.

Soft Landing, or a Harder Fall?

Florida’s housing correction is not (yet) a collapse, but it marks a clear inflection point. After years of rapid growth powered by unique pandemic-era tailwinds, the state now faces a reckoning. The market’s sensitivity to shifts in migration, insurance, and regulation — amplified by its highly cyclical nature — suggests that further downside is possible in vulnerable regions, particularly those with aging condo stock or recent storm damage.

While Miami and Orlando have so far bucked the broader trend — with modest price gains over the past year — these gains are narrowing, and headwinds are strengthening. Without another wave of inbound buyers or a meaningful retreat in borrowing and insurance costs, Florida’s real estate market may remain under pressure well into 2025.

In short, what went up fastest is now coming down hardest. For investors and policymakers alike, Florida’s unfolding housing correction offers a cautionary tale in boom-bust dynamics — and a reminder that fundamentals, not just momentum, ultimately anchor real estate markets.

Every winter, hundreds of thousands of older Canadians spend the winter in the United States. But in recent weeks, we’ve seen many Canadian snowbirds shifting their attention to other matters.

First, stories started to emerge from those who said they would no longer participate in this seasonal migration because of political events in the U.S. Another related concern was the weakened Canadian dollar. This trend has prompted some to consider selling their winter properties in the U.S.

More recently, attention has shifted to the potential for changed border rules to lessen snowbirds’ access to the U.S. for long stays. Snowbirds are concerned about administrative and procedural requirements that may ultimately make cross-border travel less convenient.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, some Canadian snowbirds experienced challenges crossing into the U.S. for the winter or returning to Canada. Closures of borders to non-essential travel did not dissuade some from planning to winter in the U.S.

Drawing on research in snowbird communities, we found out that affordability and ease of movement are two important enablers of long-stay seasonal travel.

Because of this, it’s not surprising that we’re hearing from snowbirds again in light of recent developments.

Economic and political disruptions

While COVID-era travel disruptions didn’t stop some snowbirds from going south for the winter, the current economic and political disruptions are another story. Florida is a popular destination for Canadian snowbirds. In fact, a 2023 survey named eight of the 10 best American destination communities as being in Florida.

If Canadian snowbirds are talking about cancelling travel plans and selling properties, people in Florida should be paying attention.

Instead, in early March, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis downplayed what it would mean for Canadians to avoid travel to the state. Citing a recent tourism industry report, he noted that only 3.3 million of the 142.9 million visitors to Florida in 2024 were from Canada.

DeSantis went on to say “that’s not much of a boycott, in my book.” But 91.5 per cent of Florida’s annual visitors were from the U.S. This means that the 2.3 per cent of visitors who were Canadian were actually a substantial portion of the states’s international visitors.

DeSantis’s recent comments were also not in line with concerns raised during the COVID-19 pandemic that signalled substantial negative economic impacts for the state if Canadian snowbirds did not arrive for the winter.

Community members

Aside from these economic impacts, something we’ve learned through our years of research with Canadians who winter in the U.S. is that many become vital members of destination communities. From participating in public health outreach programs to volunteering at local hospitals, our research has shown that many embrace opportunities to be active in the places they reside for the winter.

Any drop in the numbers of seasonal travellers going to U.S. destinations will have social costs for communities beyond the quantifiable economic losses.

Many popular U.S. destination communities for snowbirds have health systems that are designed to expand and retract with dramatically different seasonal populations. Our research has observed this most closely in Yuma, Ariz., where entire areas of the main local hospital are closed in the summer and staffed seasonally in the winter.

Additionally, some of the seasonal nursing staff who arrive for the winter are from Canada. Any retreat from these destinations by Canadian snowbirds may have significant implications for health systems and allied sectors. This can ultimately impact the quality of care they can provide to a more limited local patient base.

Intangible impacts

While the economic impacts of the seeming loss of long-stay older Canadians in these communities are important to consider, there will be other — less measurable but no less important — impacts. Just as the long friendship between the U.S. and Canada is now being tested, blended snowbird communities of older North Americans are at risk of diminishing.

Business owners in U.S. destinations spoke up about losses when fewer Canadian snowbirds went south during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some Canadian business sectors and communities discovered opportunities emerging from these shifts in consumer’ movements.

As snowbirds debate whether to navigate new border complexities and return to the U.S. next winter, we must be attentive to the stories behind the numbers to understand the true impacts of their decisions. And as comments made by DeSantis and other politicians have made clear, Canadian snowbirds are now faced with new economic and emotional considerations.

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With massive growth in school voucher programs, the Florida Senate on Friday released a plan that, in part, would seek to address funding concerns as students move between schools. The Senate Pre-K-12 Education Appropriations Committee is scheduled Wednesday to take up the bill (SPB 7030), which would make changes affecting public schools and voucher programs.

“Over the last few years, we have learned that for the money to truly follow the student, we need better ways to track where students are at key points throughout the school year,” Sen. Don Gaetz, a Niceville Republican who will take a lead on the legislation, said in a prepared statement Friday. “We also need to ensure money appropriately follows the student to the family’s provider of choice, including when they move back and forth between providers. With input from stakeholders across the spectrum of school choice, this bill creates reasonable timeframes and mechanisms to improve both transparency and efficiency in education funding.”

The bill, among other things, would create what is known as a “categorical” budget fund for the Family Empowerment Scholarship Program, a major voucher program. Categorical funds are earmarked for specific programs. Also, the bill would use an “educational enrollment stabilization program” to provide supplemental money to address enrollment changes during the course of the academic year in public schools and voucher programs.

“In the new environment of universal choice, where the money follows the student, we know everyone is working diligently to ensure students have access to the educational settings their parents choose,” Pre-K-12 Education Appropriations Chairman Danny Burgess, R-Zephyrhills, said. “However, as our choice programs expand, mid-year transitions have proven difficult to keep track of. Additionally, parents with students in the personalized education program and unique abilities program (voucher programs) have been frustrated by the reimbursement process, which can be quite time consuming and at times inefficient. This legislation is about lessons learned over the last few years.”

–News Service of Florida